Apparently Marty McFly, Bill S. Preston, Esq., and Ted Theodore Logan were on to something. This Week in STEM, we take a brief look into the theoretical possibility of time travel. Phone booths and DeLoreans are optional for this quick read.

A Most Excellent Adventure in a DeLorean

First of all, kudos to The Conversation for trolling us all with a phone booth image (above) in their header celebrating the theoretical proof that time travel is, in fact, possible. The science behind this proof is a bit heavy, but in short, if an object in our universe has infinite mass, it will cause an infinite curve within the space-time continuum (see last week’s TWIS), which in turn, makes time travel possible.

Those of us from a certain generation grew up time travelling with the cinematic icons from Back to the Future and Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. For those that could use a refresher, let’s hop in a phone booth or a GMC DeLorean for a refresher…

In Back to the Future, Marty McFly (played by Alex P. Keaton) met up with local genius Doc Brown who made a time machine out of a DeLorean (see below, this contributor’s son stands next to THE DeLorean in an auto museum about 5 years ago). When Marty travels back in time from 1985 to 1955, he meets up with a younger Doc Brown who calls Marty out many times because he describes overwhelming and intense situations as heavy. In all likelihood, in a scene that must have been cut from the final film, Marty travelled to 2018 and met up with the physicists from the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth and knew that heavy really meant massive.

In the latter, arguably lesser film, Bill and Ted were a couple of doofus high school kids from San Dimas, CA, and their principal (the guy from Top Gun that threatened Maverick that he’d be flying cargo planes full of something hilarious out of Hong Kong) threatened them that they needed to ace their history project in order to not get kicked out of school. Long story short, George Carlin shows up wearing some rad shades and Neo’s trench coat and invites them to travel back in time in his phone booth to learn about a variety of historical events in the first-person.

As “strange things are afoot at the Circle K,” time travel may not be one of them- as long as the phone booth or DeLorean is infinitely massive.

Looking to keep your kids busy over Winter Break?

Winter break is fast approaching and the holiday spirit is floating all around us. So grab yourself a fuzzy blanket, a warm cup of hot cocoa, and get ready for the official Concept Schools’ guide to making the best of your winter break.